NESA is currently consulting on the draft K-10 syllabuses for Arabic, Modern Greek, Turkish and Vietnamese.Attending a syllabus development consultation meeting will contribute 2 hours of NESA Registered Professional Development (PD).

NESA is currently consulting on the draft K-10 syllabuses for Arabic, Modern Greek, Turkish and Vietnamese.

If you teach one of these courses, please take some time to provide NESA with feedback by completing a survey.

The surveys are available on NESA’ssyllabus development web page and close on 12 August 2018. Please set aside some time to send your feedback – you can send a written submission or complete the online survey.

​NESA advises that the Stage 6 Arabic Beginners course will be suspended following the 2019 HSC examination.

When the candidature of an HSC course falls below 15 for each of three consecutive years the subject is suspended (BOSTES 9/15). This has occurred with the Stage 6 Arabic Beginners course. Should demand and sustainability increase to a level where the subject would again become viable as an HSC course, the course may be reactivated.

Should there be a school in NSW with students wishing to study Arabic Beginners after the suspension date, schools and community members are advised that a school may seek approval to offer Arabic Beginners as a School Developed Board Endorsed Course.

Timeline for the suspension of the Arabic Beginners course2018Last year for Year 11 enrolments in Arabic Beginners2019Arabic Beginners not offered at Year 11Last year for Year 12 enrolments and HSC examination for Arabic Beginners2020Arabic Beginners not available as an HSC course. Students will not be able to repeat Arabic Beginners at Year 12.

To provide more flexibility in the development of exams, minor amendments to the exam specifications for Stage 6 Languages Continuers: Section I – Listening and Responding have been made in the following courses:

- Arabic

- Chinese

- French

- German

- Indonesian

- Italian

- Japanese

- Korean

- Modern Greek

- Spanish.

The following amended exam specifications will be implemented from the 2017 HSC exams:

- maximum text length has been increased from approximately 60 seconds to approximately 80 seconds

- exams will have approximately nine items instead of approximately 10 items.

Minor amendments have been made to the exam rubrics for Stage 6 Languages Extension: Section II – Writing in the following courses:

- Arabic

- Chinese

- French

- German

- Indonesian

- talian

- Japanese

- Modern Greek

- Spanish.

The following amendments to the rubrics will be effective for 2017 HSC exams:

- ‘present and explain or justify a point of view’ has been changed to ‘present and justify a point of view’ to improve clarity

- ‘write text appropriate to context and/or purpose and/or audience’ has been changed to ‘write text appropriate to audience, purpose and context’ to more closely align with the intention and wording of the exam specifications.